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Before They Were Movies: Early Attempts to Bring Superheroes to Life Onscreen
by Paul Young
(23 of 22)
Both DC Comics and Marvel would have you think that big-budget, blockbuster films like Superman, Spider-Man, Batman, X-Men, Green Lantern and The Avengers are their only attempts to bring popular comic book characters into the live-action arena. They would like everyone to forget the sometimes absurd, ridiculous and often ugly reality: that there were numerous early - and failed - attempts to bring super heroes to both the big and small screens.
Over the next few pages you can read about these early superhero attempts and the actors who portrayed them on-screen. Some you may be familiar with, but we'll bet you've never heard of many of them.
NOTE: This list doesn't cover every instance of every superhero who has ever appeared on TV or in a direct-to-video movie - that would be far too exhaustive. Instead, we've covered only those superheroes who have a movie already released, in development or will have one in development soon.
Over the next few pages you can read about these early superhero attempts and the actors who portrayed them on-screen. Some you may be familiar with, but we'll bet you've never heard of many of them.
NOTE: This list doesn't cover every instance of every superhero who has ever appeared on TV or in a direct-to-video movie - that would be far too exhaustive. Instead, we've covered only those superheroes who have a movie already released, in development or will have one in development soon.
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forgot Spawn
@michael – Didn’t forget him, he just didn’t have any previous attempts before his theatrical release is all.
Thanks,
Paul Young
Just FYI Wonder woman ran 1 season on ABC (nazi era) 1976-1977 then 2 seasons on cbs (current day) 1977-1979. not 3 seasons on abc as posted
Spawn was amazing.
I like the Batman. The Cape crusader is one character to be oppose with.
I still can’t believe that a ‘Black Widow’ Movie might get made before a ‘Wonder Woman’ movie. Hollywood is filled with idiots.
I have no idea why they seem to be struggling so much with Diana. The animated series seem to have a grip on her, why is it so hard to make the leap to the live action? I think Joss Whedon was probably leaning in the right direction if the action scenes could have gone the same lines as the Buffy stuff, but maybe he has some trouble with non-broken women as the central figure because he doesn’t know how to create the storyline without her making bad emotional choices to create conflict.
Hmmm, maybe I have just inadvertently pinpointed the problem. Maybe they are just too scared to go with a character that doesn’t suffer from so much internal angst? I feel like the attempts made thus far have failed because of a need to make Diana into someone they think women can relate to by making her as ordinary as most other people. Why did the first series work despite the campiness and yet they can’t seem to make a palatable non-animated production? For that matter, why do the animated versions work and why cant they just take the same idea from that? I think they need a fan to write her.
But they are still gonna have a hard time casting it because I think there are not many women anywhere, much less in the pool that hOLLYWOOD has to choose from who can pull it off. I think they’d need an open cattle call and have to go with an unknown – so no star power to headline the thing – in order for it to actually be good. It was a leap of faith to go with Lynda, but it paid off more than Cathy Lee by an absurd amount!
Gina Carano + Best candidate for Wonder Woman. Although Haywire was weak, that’s the films and the writer and directors fault. She’s gourgeous, is in phenominal shape, can ACTUALY fight and is working hard on improving her acting. She has that Strong woman vibe coming off her, but is still sexy ass hell and just look at her with the black hair she looks like Diana, only choice for me.
Actually, my choice for Wonder Woman would be Zoe Saldana. (Pic on link below). The only thing I’ve seen her in so far is Star Trek, but she was really good, and certainly pretty enough and physically fit enough for the part.
http://www.imdb.com/media/rm209239296/nm0757855
Yes I agree with that, she is slim enough, has the personality to do the part and being African American will be great now that we have Mr.Obama as president, she would make a wonderful Wonder Woman.
Wonder Woman is hard to define, even in comics. Even now she’s being revamped all over again. So I don’t blame the movies for not being able to tackle her yet.
I don’t know what anybody else thinks but Shanks Hawkman costume looks really good to me. Maybe Warners is missing the boat by not doing a Hawkman series. Just saying.
@ Dean
I thought Shank’s Hawkman costume looked good aswell. Imo WB is missing the boat by not doing series on alot of heroes.
why would anyone decide to make a movie but never release it? lol
@ben g – I assume you’re referring to Corman’s Fantastic Four? They did that to hold on to the movie rights to the characters.
Thanks,
Paul Young
this was better then the next punisher that came out..Dolph is the man!
Thomas Jane was the best Punisher!!!!!!!
Well, OK, but by that definition, neither The Shadow nor The Phantom should be included either. The Shadow started in the pulps, not in the comics, and while The Phantom began as a comic strip, that still isn’t really the comics.
how about mighty morphin power rangers the movie (1995)
with david yost amy jo johnson and jason david frank in
the big screen debut of the colorfull martial arts heros
that was mixed with colosal cyber monster mayhem battle
with cgi elements directed by bryan spicer with a hit
song were in trouble by shampoo and in 1997 thier second
big screen offering with david austin this time the cars
became the fighting transformer directed by the shows
creators shuki levy with the title power rangers turbo
the movie both movies grossed millions at cinemas world
wide but mighty morphin power rangers the movie is currently
shown constantly on the uk sattelite broadcasting service
sky movies channels and slight stories of a blu ray release
of the movie and an updated bigscreen version of the hit show.
frankie (cool bike rider)smales
frankie smales tv and movie review uk
he-man and the masters of the universe-screen debut 1984-1987(filmation)
the show is set in the fantasy world of eternia that when
he-man is not defending castle grayskull from evil skeletor
he is accident prone prince adam with his winging companion
kringer that hates transforming into the mighty battlecat
when prince adam transformed into he-man the most powerful man
of the universe which is abit superman cliche but each episode
closes with a warning to young children between right and wrong
following by two atempts to bring the small screen hero
to the big screen
he- man and she-ra secret of the sword -1985(filmation)
where he-man discovers his long lost sister
that is under a spell by the evil hoarde
and must save her the movie was a basic pilot
for she-ra the princes of power which was short lived.
masters of the universe -1987 (cannon pictures /warner bros vhs/paramount pictures tv and digital rights and mgm dvd)dir gary goddard
starring dolph lundgren frank langella courteney cox and chelsea field
co’starring james tolkan robert-duncan mcniell with meg foster and christina pickles.
plot line:
this time it was adapted into a live action version minus
he-mans companions battlecat and orko in it’s place a yoda like
creature gwildor the inventor of the traveling device called
the cosmic key that evil skeletor must possess in order to become the master of the universe and it accidently get lost in earth after the escape from grayskull goes wrong and it falls into the hands of two teenagers and an synical lapd detective that he-man must retrieve before skeletor gets both the key
and sword but the movie was an roaring success in england but recieved
mixed reviews and won awards for best special effects from the fx team
that did star wars and ghostbusters among others like e.t and poltergeist .
frankie (cool bike rider)smales
frankie smales tv and movie review uk
Are you allergic to punctuation?
What about the 1970s series Aquaman, starring Patrick Duffy? Surely other people remember that too. On ABC, I think?
Err that will be The Man from Atlantis.. not aquaman or ocean girl ..
The Flash and Wonder Woman TV series were some of the best ever!!!
i agree with mathius99
both the flash and wonder woman was the cream of 70′s and 80′s tv
my fave tv series version of the flash is the one with john wesley
shipp and amanda pays (max headroom) as the sexy tina(christina)mcgee
and mark hamil did’nt dissapoint as the devious villian the trickster
but why on earth did they try to bring wonder woman back it was ok
as it was. a poor atempt was to make the classic john hughes scifi
comedy weird science with bill paxton and anthony michael hall into
an tv series in which tanked only made two seasons of it.
an waiste of money production and the hype was to bring this wonderful
cult tv series v back by reimaging it bad mistake if they kept the formula
orginal it would have lasted like wise with flash gordon it was an total
carbon copy of smallville meets stargate sg1 that tanked after season 1
my hat goes to richard dean anderson for the success of turning the classic scifi adventure film stargate that starred kurt russell and james
spader into an longrunning tv show that garnerd awards at least the concept was original i maybe no no’1 fan of the show but my brother
is a big fan of it and what made it a huge success great wrighters and
directors .
frankie (cool bike rider)smales
frankie smales tv and movie review uk
I agree. The Flash looked awesome and even the Danny Elfman score rocked. A shame it didn’t lasted. Linda carter still looks like Wonder Woman abd she was superb. I also think that the original Tyler’s Capt. Marvel lloked like the comic version and the costume is the most accurate.
I enjoyed the 90′s Flash series with John Wesley Shipp & Mark Hamill as the Trickster aswell. I got the complete series dvd boxset. After watching main titles of Birds of Prey, im surprised they wouldn’t try makin a hour-long new live-action Batman series. If you seen how each episode of Birds of Prey began with intro scenes of Batman,Catwoman & the Joker you’d know what i mean. Lois & Clark:TNAOS was a great show imo that lasted 4 seasons & was the last live-action show of Superman to date. Smallville doesn’t count because that was mostly about Clark Kent becoming Superman as we all know at the end. Im sure a show won’t happen though since they’re already planning makin another Batman reboot.
Does anybody remember a pilot I believe Fox produced around 1994 or 95 called X-Men High or Mutant High, something along those lines? I was a kid then, but I’m pretty sure I only remembering seeing the one episode.
No but in 2001 there was a show called Mutant X by Marvel
LOL, you remember that? I thought i was the only one. That was the first show that came to my mind when i read the above article. I thought it was stupid. Wasn’t it supposed to be about the mutant known as Skin, who could stretch his skin? But I don’t think it was supposed to be a TV series, just a TV movie. That movie was ridiculous. Just dumb. LOL.
Your thinking of ‘Generation X’ that had Skin in it. A made for TV movie from the comic of the same name.
Mutant X was a different (if similiar) animal
But the Shadow! That was the best movie ever made!
hasselhoff was really actually pretty good at that part fury wasnt black until they wanted samuel l jackson for the role
Actually a lot of comic stories are divided into multiple universes to avoid continuity issues. In one of the marvel universes Nick Fury is black. I do agree however, that the only reason they made him that way was so they could cast samuel l. jackson a major role.
The Ultimate Universe version of Fury was based on Samuel L. Jackson but was done long before any plan to actually use him. He was cast because of the comics basis on him, not the other way around.
Nice one, Paul. Brought back some childhood memories. I watched Hammond’s Spiderman and the ‘struggling artist Captain America’ in the 80s and I still remember the theme songs for both of them (which I liked). Hammond’s Spidey was a decent attempt back then (though web and eye-lets were a disaster!) and although Cap failed woefully I still prefer the transparent plastic-like shield he used in it to this metallic one. It looked less cumbersome and more aerodynamic IMO.
Just one correction: Lundgren’s Punisher was not ‘rhyming’. He had a thespian drunk for an informant who did all the rhyming. Lundgren hardly spoke. Though the film may not have made it to the box office, I still feel Lundgren had the best take on the character. His almost-indifferent, dispassionate attitude towards life and killing worked better for me than the other portrayals. His old partner (Louis Gossett Jr) was also a sharp contrast and made Lundgren look more psychologically unstable which I believe Punisher should be. The other Punishers still looked redeemable- like they’d be fine after their vendetta was over. But Lundgren looked and acted like he was beyond redemption, like he had gone over the top. I wont forget when Gossett Jr grabbed him by the collar and kept barking, “Let me in!” and the man just sat there in a slump with distant look in his eyes. Beyond redemption! If you can grab a copy, give it another shot and see what I mean. Been aeons since I saw it last but the portrayal was indelible.
As for Thor in Hulk TV series, though poorly represented physically, I felt he had the personality I wanted to see more of in Helmsworth’s Thor. The brashness, pub fights, arrogance etc were all covered in that episode. Branagh did a good job but the transition from prodigal son to responsible one was quick.
TV Flash? Poor show but one of the best bodies I’ve seen on a superhero. Most of these shows failed woefully in comparison to what we have now but if you look deeper, you’d find lessons to be learnt and adopted for future adaptations.
What about Generation X!?!? Some of the effects were cheesy but I enjoyed it.
THOR IS A GOD! THOR IS A GOD! He was born of two gods (Odin and Frigga). Hercules is a demi-god. He was born of a god (Zeus) and a mortal. I wish with all the money and all the research done on The AVENGERS, they should have gotten that little tidbit right!
not to be a pain but hi mother is gaiha
you left out soidermans early days in dragon summat or other where they obviously used ropes for web, it was hilarious, and on the subject of captain america i’m sure at least one film was made wh an italian red skull,also on the original x-men cartoons they have a special episode of cap america but wolverine has no bone claws?! in that episode he is told to use gloves. i think the dispute is settled in the big bang theory but kinda pisses on the continuity somewhat. I also seem to recall Ms marvel havin a crack at a film in the 80s too, the sad thing of it all is fans of the comics, films and games get next to no continuity and no sort of story share whonce they are out of there. hence wolverines real name is James Howlett… in a film dedicated to find his history it divulges nothing that isn’t really popular interest. my final rant is that cyclops and iceman helped form the x-men, and were older than portrayed by this time too
superhero films are awesome as long as you’ve got the character history locked down right
With all the love towards Lundgren’s Punisher it should be removed from this awful list, and did I see Flash on there come on now (going back to check if Flash was on this awful list)
Yep,the 1990′s Flash and The Incredible Hulk all thrown in there
This is horrible. This article is riddled with VERY amateur mistakes. I’ll just name a few, and since you’ve been made aware of your laughable spelling and apparently don’t comprehend how to use the amazingly complicated tool called Spell Check, I’ll stick to factual errors. In Smallville, you keep referring to the Justice Society when you mean the Justice League and you don’t seem to know that Impulse is not The Flash. (He’s Bart Allen, not Barry Allen.) “The first ever TV series” of which you speak was a never-aired pilot that barely had anything to do with The Shadow and never even shows him in costume. It did not make it to series. The CBS version of “The Flash” was canceled primarily due to budget concerns, though ratings were also a factor. And The best part is that you thought the 1966 Batman movie was only released in Austin! What the hell? How you would even come up with something like that is a genuine curiosity. Why would you think that? Do you live in Austin and maybe you assumed you were the only city that got it?
Wow. Just wow.
You’re probably never going to read this, but in case you do, this is a recurring pattern for you. I notice amateur spelling errors all the time, there is no consistency on facts, except maybe that you don’t seem to care about them, and your writing style is considerably less than professional. I do not get paid for writing comments. You presumably do get paid to write these articles. And good for you! If I could get paid to half-ass my job and put in nearly no effort, I would too. Maybe you think since people read this tripe and don’t bother to call you out most of the time you just think it’s A-Okay. Please, I implore you, just do a little fact checking, use spell check, and take some writing lessons. You need them. Desperately.
Again, Wow. Just wow.
Bart Allen was Barry Allens son who started out as Kid Flash, went on to become Impulse and finally become the official Flash when his father retired. So yes, Impulse is, in fact, The Flash. Just sayin’.
Actually, Bart was Barry Allen’s GRANDSON from an alternate future. But, yes, he did become Kid Flash and, briefly, Flash before being killed by The Rogues. Of course, that was all before the “New52″ reboot!
I was running on memories from years ago, I had a feeling my info might be slightly faulty but felt it was okay to be lazy given the point was that he was the flash at one point. :p
Oh, one more thing. Matthew Steele did not play Green Lantern. Matthew SETTLE did.
For God’s sake…
How in the world do you read this article?
After clicking on the “start” button on the 1st page, I get stuck on the Superman article with no way to move forward.
What gives?
Matches,
Strange. It works fine for me in multiple browsers on both PC and Mac…
Vic
@ Vic
Matches isn’t the only one. Samething happend to me with the article about Will Smith with multiple pages to click to continue. I only got to the first page on that. Thought id let you know. I thought taking my computer in to be checked looked at because i couldn’t find any virus.
The Phantom came out in ’96, not ’98. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0117331/
Turkish Version of “The Phantom” released in ’68. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0292058/
I know it calls him “The Red Mask” instead of the Phantom but thats because the Phantom comic strip (which was incredibly popular in Turkey) was released under that name.
You made a mistake, “The Phantom” movie was released in 1996, not 1998. For “The Phantom”, you forgot the 2009 miniseries starring Ryan Carnes is the title role, as well as “Defenders of the Earth”, where The Phantom was voiced by Peter Mark Richman, and “Phantom 2040″ where The Phantom was voiced by Scott Valentine.
By the way, the 1990 “Captain America” movie was released to theatres, at least here in Canada, the same with ’89s “Punisher” movie.
lol! All except the fantastic 4
Gina Carano isn’t the right build or facial structure for Wonder Woman. Try Alexandra Daddario. I think she’d be pretty good. Although no one could ever beat Lynda Carter!
Daddario may be closer to Carter, but Carano is the kind of Wonder Woman the New Millennium needs. Powerful-looking without being overly muscular, and she’s got the size (5’8″) without looking like a monster.
She’d make a perfect Amazon!